


Comes With Instructions

by rageprufrock



Category: Smallville
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-04
Updated: 2010-07-04
Packaged: 2017-10-10 09:37:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/98231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rageprufrock/pseuds/rageprufrock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"But meanwhile, I'll be staying at the Metropolis Grande."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Comes With Instructions

"What are you doing?"

Lex looked up from where he was doing one last check of his things: expensive clothes, antique books, priceless and irreplaceable copies of Warrior Angel numbers one through thirty-eight, several pairs of very tasteful shoes, and his Game Boy. It seemed as if he was ready to go.

"I'm leaving you," Lex said cheerfully, smiling at Clark, who was beginning to look at if he was going to have one of his famous sulks right there in the front hall.

"What? Why are you leaving?" Clark asked, obviously distressed.

Lex gave him a flat look. "I think we both know why."

Clark wrung his hands together nervously. He said, "I meant it hypothetically."

Shouldering his laptop bag, he picked up his suitcase. "Of course you did," Lex said soothingly. "But meanwhile, I'll be staying at the Metropolis Grande."

An hour later, Lex checked into Penthouse Seven. Out of perverse curiosity, he watched the Oxygen Network, and felt pretty good about it when he realized that Bliss was mostly just lesbian sex.

*

At three AM, Clark called.

"I don't think you're being very fair about this," he whined into the phone. "Lots of couples do this sort of thing." There was a short pause, and the sound of the doorbell, which meant Clark had retreated into ordering pizza with which to comfort himself. "I think you're just afraid of the commitment."

Lex hung up on him and went back to sleep.

*

The next day, at the office, he wrote Clark an email with lots of links to webpages that described why exactly what Clark wanted couldn't happen, most of which were fundamentalist Christian and all of which were are least Republican.

Half an hour later, while Lex was buying out an upstart research and development biotech firm, Clark emailed him back saying that Lex was being a chickenshit and overly concerned about how he looked. It wasn't like it was permanent or anything.

Lex scowled, and put his conference call on hold so he could write back:

"If you keep this up, I'm telling your mother."

At the end of the day, Lex scheduled a large, shiny public event about children and charities, which was the sort of Metro fluff that Clark was stuck writing at the Daily Planet, and made sure that the City Desk editor got a glowing press release about it. He also made sure there was assigned seating for reporters--in the front row.

Wednesday's Planet had a lovely page three package about LexCorp's latest donation to the Metropolis Children's Hospice, by Clark Kent. The photo wasn't color but at least the lede was respectable, even if the Planet's headlines left much to be desired.

Lex admired his own cleverness only briefly because at half past nine that evening Clark called again.

"You did that on purpose. To keep me from having time to talk to you," Clark accused. "Why don't you want to try this?"

Lex said, "Clark, it just doesn't work that way. It's unnatural."

"Asshole," Clark said, and hung up.

Lex sat on his gloriously enormous king sized bed and wrote a long, detailed email to the City editor at the Daily Planet, communicating minor flaws in tonal qualities in Staff Reporter Kent's article. It came out to just under three pages, and Lex sent it off with a smile, falling asleep next to his still-opened laptop, satisfied.

*

"I'm as open-minded as anybody, Mrs. Kent," Lex said, tapping the glass-top table at a Metropolis café, "but there are some things that just shouldn't happen."

She nodded sympathetically and smiled. "He is asking for an awful lot."

"It's a huge risk," Lex agreed, scowling. "Not to mention the potential death, doom, and pain."

"Well," Martha demurred. "Maybe it'd be worth it in the end."

Lex's face went two shades too pale. "Oh, don't tell me you agree with him about this plan."

She reached over and patted his hand. Her hair was a duller red, graying at the temples, and she had more laugh lines and crow's feet than before, but Martha Kent was still a beautiful woman, one of the few in the world who still held Lex in her sway. This was a potentially explosive situation. At that exact moment, three cars collided on the street and the sky opened up thundering with cracking lightning--like some sort of sign from God. Lex started debating the relative merits of distracting her and running away as quickly and as far away as possible.

"Well, I certainly see why he wants you to agree to this," Martha told him gently. "But I also agree that it's very risky. Still, we don't even know that it'd work."

"Why are you talking about this like it's a probability?" Lex asked, horrified.

"I don't think it's wrong to want to see my son to be part of a real family," Martha scolded, and Lex momentarily wanted to agree with her, but realized that she was mad, just as crazy as her crazy son.

"We are a real family," Lex argued. "We have a house and some cars and some minions and a whole universe of press who make up stories about us--that's family!"

Martha frowned at him.

Lex leaned back in his chair, sulking. "I'm so totally not doing this."

*

By Friday, Lex was horny and bored, so he briefly considered giving Clark a booty call until he remembered that sex was what got him into this whole mess to begin with. So he took a cold shower and read the New York Times and played Bejeweled for three hours.

Just shy of midnight, Superman knocked on his balcony door.

"Go away," Lex said. "Keep your loins away from me."

Clark made a face that made Lex feel like he'd just stoned a puppy or something, so he sighed and hauled himself out of his desk chair and opened the balcony door. It was March in Kansas and strangely cold, so Lex felt a brief shiver when a gust of wind rushed by and flapped Clark's cape in a very heroic manner.

"Hi," Clark said, preternaturally bright.

"Oh, Christ," Lex muttered, and turned around to walk back to his computer.

"I just think you should give it a chance," Clark said, following him in and shutting the door behind him, like any good, all-American superhero would. "We have a very rare opportunity you know. Not everybody gets this."

Lex turned around to gape at him. "Clark, nobody gets this. Do you know why?"

Clark opened his mouth but Lex cut him off:

"Because men are not supposed to do that sort of thing!" Lex yelled, waving his hands.

Clark pouted. "If you're worried about stretch marks, I'll love you anyway," he said hopefully.

"I am not gestating your spawn," Lex said, voice acidic.

Clark took a big step forward, an open, loving smile on his face and his arms wide as Lex pulled an expression of unadulterated horror and jumped back, saying, "What is this? What are you doing? Get away from me."

"Most people would think it's romantic being asked to have someone's baby," Clark complained.

"I'm going to burn down the Fortress of Solitude," Lex swore. "It's filled you with horrible lies."

Clark flopped on the bed and grinned sweetly. "Don't you think that'd be cool Lex? Our baby."

Lex was getting a headache just thinking about it. "No! No it would not be cool!" he yelled.

"We don't even know if it'll work," Clark said thoughtfully.

"You're insane!" Lex roared. "How the hell would it even come out? I'll get fat!"

The situation was rapidly spiraling out of control. Lex wondered if he could call security and have Superman arrested for trespassing. Or attempted impregnation of an unsuspecting human being.

"But I think it's worth a try," Clark finished, beaming at Lex like he wasn't even listening.

Lex narrowed his eyes. "These," he said thinly, "are not birthing hips, Clark."

"You could have a C-section."

Lex pointed at the window. "Get out of my room."

Clark looked devastated. "Can we at least have sex?"

Lex considered this briefly. "Yes. But I'm on top."

*

On Sunday, Lex went back to the penthouse to pick up some more shoes, and found Clark sitting in their bathroom staring darkly at some printouts that had the gaudy Fortress of Solitude watermark on them. He was biting his lip in concentration.

"Trying to see if you can impregnate me with your mind?" Lex asked sarcastically.

Clark scowled at him. "No!" he yelled, and snatched a white stick off of the sink, saying tensely, "I think I read those information packets wrong the first time."

"Thank Jesus," Lex muttered, and put one hand protectively over his beautiful, flat stomach as he walked toward the bedroom, relieved that this whole psychotic episode was over. "I'm glad you've managed to move past--"

"Oh my God!" Clark shrieked. "It came up positive!"


End file.
